Review of Forrest Gump (1994) by Owen B — 17 Jan 2015
"Mama always told me life is like a box of chocolates ... ".
Robert Zemeckis' feel-good movie, starring an on-top-form of Tom Hanks as the titular and somewhat dull-witted central character, who manages to be involved in plenty of important events of the late 20th century (teaching Elvis how to dance, the Vietnam War, the Watergate scandal and so on), with Gump's seemingly charmed life shown in counterpart to that of his childhood friend Jenny (drugs, depression, attempted suicide, etc).
As is probably well-known, the film also takes actual historical footage, and manages to transport Hank's character into the same: we see him, for instance, meeting President Nixon (prior to Watergate), as well as being involved in the abolition of apartheid when african-born students first go to college.
Yes, the film does stretch a tad longer than it needs to and, yes, the cynics amongst us will find themselves rolling their eyes at various stages, but this is still a film to watch at least once.
This review of Forrest Gump (1994) was written by Owen B on 17 Jan 2015.
Forrest Gump has generally received very positive reviews.
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